Delays Plague Disabled Woman Still Waits For Check Year Later

Linda Hudson finally expects to receive the Social Security disability pay she has been fighting to get for a year.

An administrative hearing judge told the Boca Raton woman last week he would approve her mental-illness disability request. The first check should arrive in about two months.

But that will not be soon enough for Hudson, 46, who will be out on the streets at the end of the month and has no savings left to pay rent somewhere else.

In the year since she filed her claim, Hudson has defaulted on two home- equity loans. Lenders foreclosed on her San Remo Golf & Tennis condominium and auctioned it off in February.

Hudson gave up her leased car in July because she could no longer make the payments. She started receiving food stamps in the fall. She has been selling off her clothes and furniture to survive.

``I`ve still got the worry of finding a place to move to,`` she said. ``It`s like I`ll always be a victim.``

Disability-approval delays plague thousands of Americans. President Clinton has asked Congress to provide an extra $302 million to speed up the process. The money would be used to modernize computers and to pay for overtime and extra workers.

The number of people filing claims is on the increase, adding to the burden. As of last week, Florida had 86,949 claims filed this year, an increase of 16 percent from the same time last year, said Darryl Mull, regional spokesman for the Social Security Administration in Atlanta.

For Hudson, who suffers from depression, panic attacks and obsessive behavior, the wait has been agonizing.

``I`m not sick enough to go into the hospital and I`m not well enough to work,`` she said.

Hudson moved to Boca Raton from Kentucky in 1990 and tried continuing her career selling real estate. She found it increasingly difficult to work or even leave her home as her symptoms became worse.

It was after she attempted suicide in November 1991 that she met Dr. Abbey Strauss, a psychiatrist, who diagnosed her illness. Strauss supports her claim.

``Just because it`s not a physical disability, like a broken leg or an amputation, it is no less real,`` Strauss said. ``For her, it is a very profound problem.``

Most people who are eligible for disability payments receive approval after their initial claims are filed, which can take up to 100 days, officials said.

Longer delays come for people, like Hudson, whose initial claims are denied. Her reconsideration was also denied and she waited months to have her appeal heard.

Some 2,300 appeals for disability claims are pending at the Social Security area office in Fort Lauderdale, which serves an area from Broward County north to Fort Pierce and west to Fort Myers, office manager Sharon Larkin said.

The office`s goal is to have a final decision within 200 days after an appeal is filed, Larkin said.

But the office, which is ranked first in productivity of 31 offices in the southeastern United States, is having trouble meeting even that goal. Larkin said appeals filed in October probably will not be heard until May.

Because of Hudson`s situation, she was squeezed in early when a canceled appointment left an opening before administrative law Judge Jerome Lowen.

She should receive a retroactive check for about $6,500 and then monthly payments of about $800, said her attorney, Lilli Marder. Hudson does not know what she will do until the checks arrive, but she is determined to use the disability time to get her life back together.

``(The judge) has granted it for two years,`` she said. ``If I could get well in six months, I would quit it right there.``